Sayeef
SALAHUDDIN
University of California Berkeley
USA
Home / Invited speakers
Sayeef
SALAHUDDIN
University of California Berkeley
USA
Clivia
SOTOMAYOR TORRES
ICN2
Portugal
Roberto
GÓMEZ CALVET
European University of Valencia
Spain
Francisco
Savall
IES Veles e Vents
Spain
José Luis
SÁNCHEZ GÓMEZ
University of León
Spain
Yolanda
PREZADO
Institut Curie
France
Ursulla
KELLER
ETH Zurich
Switzerland
Olga
SMIRNOVA
Max Born Institute
Berlin
Juan Ignacio
CIRAC
Max Planck Institute for Quantum
Optics
Germany
Javier
AIZPURUA
Donostia International Physics Center
Spain
Ricardo
DÍEZ
Donostia International Physics Center
Spain
Jorge
MIRA
University of Santiago de Compostela
Spain
Alessandra
BUONANNO
Max Planck Institute for Gravitational
Physics
Germany
Jonathan
HOME
ETH Zurich
Switzerland
Jorge
MÉNDEZ
University of La Laguna Tenerife
Spain
Irene
ABRIL
University of Cambridge
Spain
Verónica
SANZ
Universities of Valencia
Spain
Inmaculada
PÉREZ PÉREZ
Friedrich Schiller University Jena
Pedro Miguel
ECHENIQUE
Universities of Basque country
Spain
Itziar
OTEGUI
Outreach Manager at CIC nanoGUNE
Spain
Jorge
Bravo-Abad
Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (UAM)
Spain
Claudio
Zeni
Cambridge
United Kingdom
Javier Aizpurua is an Ikerbasque research professor at Donostia International Physics Center (DIPC) in San Sebastián and distinguished researcher at the University of the Basque Country, leading the "Theory of Nanophotonics Group", where he studies interactions between light and matter at the nanoscale. He previously worked at the Center for Materials Physics of CSIC, Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in the US. He has published more than 200 works on the topic of nanoplasmonics, particularly in the area of nanoantenna-enhanced microscopy and spectroscopy, with particular emphasis on quantum surface effects in plasmonics.
A metallic nanogap is a superb configuration to explore the interplay between light and
matter. Light scattered off,or emitted from a nanogap carries the information of the
surrounding electromagnetic environment with it. This situation becomes even more appealing
when a molecule is located in the gap of the plasmonic cavity or in its proximity, with the
molecule playing an active role either in the electromagnetic coupling with the cavity, or
even partici-
pating in processes of charge injection and transfer, as revealed through cutting-edge
molecular spectroscopy.
In this talk, the process of interaction between a molecular
emitter and a nanocavity will addressed by means of different theoretical frameworks which
involve aspects of condensed matter physics, quantum chemistry, and cavity-quantum
electrodynamics.
A battery of methodologies to address the dynamics of electrons
photo-emitted from nanogaps, ultra resolution in atomic-scale photoluminescence, or
non-linear regimes in molecular optomechanics will be described, and many of the theoretical
insights obtained will be interpreted in the context of state-of-the-art
experimental results in nanophotonics.
Ricardo Díez Muiño holds a PhD degree in physics by the University of the Basque Country. He further developed his scientific career at the University of Bordeaux (France) and at the LBNL (Berkeley, USA). Díez Muiño later joined, as a CSIC researcher, the Centro de Física de Materiales (CSIC-UPV/EHU) where he served as Deputy Director (2005 – 2011) and Director (2011 – 2015). He is currently Ikerbasque Professor and Director (since 2013) of the Donostia International Physics Center. His main fields of research are chemical physics and condensed matter theory, in particular molecular dynamics at surfaces, the theory of electronic excitations, and the theory of photoemission and photoelectron diffraction. He has published more than 120 scientific articles, as well as two books. Díez Muiño has been the organizer or coorganizer of 5 international conferences. He is Vicepresident of Euskampus Campus of Excellence, Board Member of CIC nanoGUNE, and very active in science communication activities.
Yolanda Prezado is a research director at the French National Center for Scientific Research
(CNRS) and head of the interdisciplinary team New Approaches in Radiotherapy (NARA), based
at Institut Curie (France). She has a multidisciplinary background. She received her Ph.D.
in Physics from the University of Santiago de Compostela, Spain, in 2003. She is a Medical
Physics expert (board certified in Spain and France). She did her Medical Physics residency
at Hospital of Salamanca (Spain, 2004-2007), and later worked at Hospital of Pamplona until
she was recruited as a beamline scientist at the Biomedical Beamline at the European
Synchrotron Radiation Facility. Since 2011 she has been a permanent scientist at the
CNRS.
Her main interests are innovative radiotherapy techniques, combined radio-immunotherapies,
radiobiology, and small field dosimetry. Her main focus are spatially fractionated radiation
therapy and proton therapy. One of their main projects is proton minibeam radiation therapy,
funded by the European Union via an ERC consolidator grant. She has been the chair of the
scientific committee of the European Federation of Medical Physicists from 2019 to 2021 and
is the deputy spokesperson of the International Biophysics Collaboration. She has served on
many committees and working groups. Her work in proton therapy has been rewarded with the Mr
et Mme Peyre prize of the French Academy of Sciences in 2021.
S. Salahuddin is the TSMC Distinguished Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at the University of California Berkeley. His group explores physics for low power electronic and spintronic devices. He is mostly known for the discovery of the Negative Capacitance effect that shows substantial promise for logic, memory and energy storage devices. Salahuddin received the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientist and Engineers (PECASE) from President Obama. Salahuddin also received several other awards including the National Science Foundation CAREER award, the IEEE Nanotechnology Early Career Award, the Young Investigator Awards from the Airforce Office of Scientific Research and the Army Research Office, and the IEEE George E Smith Award. Salahuddin is a co-director of the Berkeley Device Modeling Center (BDMC) and Berkeley Center for Negative Capacitance Transistors (BCNCT). Salahuddin was also a co-director of ASCENT, which is a flagship device technology effort in the US, jointly supported by SRC and DARPA. He served as the chair the IEEE Electron Devices Society committee on Nanotechnology (2014-16) and is currently the Editor-in-Chief of the IEEE Electron Devices Letters, the premier journal for electron devices. Salahuddin is a Fellow of the IEEE and the APS.
J. Ignacio Cirac is a Spanish physicist, director of Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics
in Germany, and a Board Member of Telefonica S.A. He is an expert in quantum computing and
communication. With his collaborators, he introduced the first theoretical proposals of
quantum computing, simulation, and repeaters, and developed a theory of tensor networks to
solve problems quantum physics. He studied theoretical physics and gained his PhD at the
University Complutense of Madrid. After a postdoc at JILA (Boulder, US) and becoming
Associate Professor at the University of Castilla-La Mancha (Spain) he became Professor of
Theoretical Physics at the University of Innsbruck (Austria) in 1996. Since 2001 he is
director of the Theory Division at the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics in Garching
(Germany) and Honorary Professor at the Technical University of Munich.
He is the director of the International Max-Planck Research School on Quantum Science and
Technology, co-speaker of the Munich Center for Quantum Science and Technology, and
coordinates the consortium on theoretical quantum computing in the Munich Quantum Valley.
For his work he has been awarded several prizes, among them the Prince of Asturias, the BBVA
frontiers of knowledge, the Benjamin Franklin Medal, the Wolf Prize, and the Max-Planck
Medal. He is a member of the Spanish, Bavarian, and German Academies of Sciences, and holds
eight honorary doctor degrees.
Jorge Mira Pérez is a full professor of electromagnetism at the faculty of physics of the
University of Santiago de Compostela (USC). His research has focused on materials science,
dynamics of social systems, medical-related areas, and electrical and civil engineering. He
has been recognized, among others, with the 2022 Galician Medal of Research. He was head of
the department of applied physics at USC, advisor to the Spanish ministry of science for the
creation of the International Iberian Nanothecnology Lab (INL), member of the committee of
experts of the Galician government on Covid-19 and member of the commission of experts of
the government of Spain for the reform of the official time.
He is also active in science communication in mass media (television, radio, newspapers),
writing books or leading several activities, such as the Program ConCiencia, developed with
the participation of Nobel laureates. He has been recognized, among others, with the 2023
Prize of the Confederation of Scientific Societies of Spain for the dissemination of
science.
La transmisión de información científica al gran público nunca ha sido fácil, pero la
situación se ha complicado en la última década con la aparición de nuevas dinámicas
sociales. Por ejemplo, los grupos negacionistas del cambio climático, terraplanistas y
antivacunas son ahora más activos y agresivos, debido a las posibilidades que abren los
nuevos canales y redes de comunicación. Analizaremos este escenario con algunos ejemplos
agudos.
Se explorará además, desde una perspectiva personal, un caso en el cual el debate científico
interdisciplinar ha permeado de modo notable en la opinión pública: la comunicación de
investigaciones que atañen a la normativa horaria oficial en España, un campo en el cual es
difícil a veces la transmisión a la ciudadanía de informaciones basadas en datos.
Francisco Savall Alemany has a degree in Physics by the University of Valencia (UV) and a
PhD by the University of Alicante (UA). He has been awarded in 2023 with the RSEF-Fundación
BBVA Award for Physics Teaching and Dissemination in the category of Secondary Education. He
currently teaches Physics and Chemistry at IES Veles e Vents at Grau de Gandia. For more
than 10 years he has combined his work as a high school teacher with teaching and research
as associate professor at the University of Alicante, being member of the Research Group in
Didactics of Experimental Sciences.
His main field of research is the development of innovative materials for Physics teaching,
many of which have been published in prestigious national and international journals. As a
result of this work, he has given teacher training courses aimed at improving Physics
teaching in secondary and high school.
Francisco Savall also carries out physics dissemination activities. In this field, he
participates assiduously with his students in the Experimenta Science Fair, in which they
have been awarded in 2024, he has published several dissemination science articles and is
member of the editorial board of the science dissemination magazine DAU AL DEU.
Francisco Savall Alemany es Licenciado en Física por la Universitat de València (UV) y
Doctor por la Universidad de Alicante (UA). Ha sido galardonado en 2023 con el Premio
RSEF-Fundación BBVA a la Enseñanza y Divulgación de la Física en la modalidad de Enseñanzas
Medias. Actualmente es profesor de Física y Química en el IES Veles e Vents del Grau de
Gandia. Durante más de 10 años ha compaginado su trabajo como profesor de instituto con la
docencia e investigación como profesor asociado en la Universidad de Alicante, en el Grupo
de Investigación en Didáctica de las Ciencias Experimentales.
Su principal campo de investigación es la elaboración de materiales innovadores para la
enseñanza de la Física, muchos de los cuales han sido publicados en revistas de reconocido
prestigio nacional e internacional. Fruto de este trabajo, ha impartido cursos de formación
del profesorado cuyo objetivo es la mejora de la enseñanza de la Física en secundaria y
bachillerato. Francisco Savall también lleva a cabo actividades de divulgación de la
física.
En este campo, participa asiduamente con sus estudiantes en la Feria-Concurso Experimenta,
en la que han sido premiados en 2024, y ha publicado diversos artículos de divulgación y
forma parte del consejo de redacción de la revista de divulgación DAU AL DEU.
La investigación ha reconocido la importancia de competencias como la argumentación, el
pensamiento crítico y la resolución de problemas en la enseñanza de la Física, llevando a
los estudiantes no solo a aprender contenidos científicos sino también qué es la ciencia y a
desarrollar actividades propias de la investigación científica.
Presentaremos diversos trabajos experimentales que se han implementado en el aula en cursos
introductorios de Física, fácilmente adaptables tanto a estudios universitarios como de
bachillerato. Abarcaremos campos diversos: el principio de Arquímedes, la espectroscopía y
la física cuántica o la termodinámica de los motores térmicos. Analizaremos, además, el
impacto que han tenido estas propuestas sobre el aprendizaje de los estudiantes en el aula.
Roberto Gómez Calvet is a permanent lecturer in the business department of the European
University of
Valencia. He also lectured for 14 years at the University of Valencia and works regularly
with the
Polytechnic University of Valencia and the University of La Laguna. In the research field,
his current
lines of work deal with energy and the environment together with efficiency models using
non-parametric
techniques. He has written various articles and chapters of books about eco-efficiency,
promoting
variable renewable energies and fitting them into the electrical grid. His most recent
papers concern the
energy transition in Spain, published in high-impact journals including Renewable and
Sustainable
Energy Reviews, Applied Energy, Renewable Energy, European Physical Journal Plus and
Energies. He
is an honorary senior research fellow at De Montfort University (Leicester, UK).
He
trained as an
industrial engineer, specialising in energy techniques, at the Polytechnic University of
Valencia, holds a
degree in Economics and Business from the University of Valencia, an MBA from APD and a
doctorate
in Economics from the Jaume I University of Castelló. In the professional sphere, it should
be highlighted
that since the 90s he has held responsible positions in different companies in the Valencia
region. He
continues to combine his academic and professional careers, seeking points of convergence
and
cooperation between university, business and society. Also, in recent years he has been
active in the
media, including press, TV and radio, informing about matters relating to energy, the
environment and
decarbonisation of the economy.
Since its inception, the European Union has had energy scarcity as one of the most important
problems. During the last two decades a significant effort has been carried out to develop
an energy transition base on the shift in energy production, distribution, and consumption
models not only to reduce dependence from third countries, but also to mitigate greenhouse
gas emissions. This transition is based on the search of new energy sources, the
electrification and digitalization of all processes and sectors of the economy, aiming to
achieve decarbonization through the use of non-polluting energy resources.
In this context, the role of physicists is paramount, as they can make significant
contributions to the energy transition in several ways:
Research and Innovation: Physicists can contribute to the
development of new technologies and solutions that facilitate the transition to renewable
energy sources. This could include research into more efficient solar panels, wind turbines,
or energy storage solutions.
Education and communication: By improving global scientific
literacy through physics education, physicists can help the public understand the importance
and implications of the energy transition.
Policy Development: Physicists can use their expertise to
inform policy decisions related to energy use and climate change. They can provide valuable
insights into the potential impacts of different energy policies.
Advocacy: Physicists can advocate for greater investment in
physics research and innovation, emphasizing the role of physics in addressing climate
change and transitioning to a sustainable energy future.
Professor of Applied Physics at Universidad de La Laguna (Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain)
and researcher in luminescent materials with “rare earth” elements and in the applications
of nanotechnology and photonics to renewable energies (solar energy, “green hydrogen”,
“artificial photosynthesis”). Principal Investigator of the “MAGEC-REEsearch” Project
(“Materials for Advanced Energy Generation in the Canary Islands and exploration of
rare-earth resources”), financed by the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of Spain and
by the Research Agency of the of Canary Islands Government.
The project is focused, on the one hand, on exploring the “rare earth” mineral resources in
the Canary Islands and, on the other hand, on the development of photonic applications of
the latest generation, from the improvement of photocatalysis and generation of solar fuels
to the development of luminescent security inks. He has 100 scientific publications in
prestigious international journals, three six-year periods of research, as well as three
industrial patents on luminescent nanomaterials with technological applications. President
of the International Organizing Committee of the SHIFT series of international conferences
on light applications in renewable energy and biomedicine, www.shifttenerife.com.
Responsible for the weekly scientific dissemination program “Pura Ciencia” that has been
broadcast on the air in prime time in the morning within the program “Hoy por Hoy” Tenerife
(Cadena SER Radio Club Tenerife) and “Hoy por Hoy El Drago” (SER Las Palmas) since July 2021
and continues today. Scientific disseminator and organizer of scientific culture events,
among others, around the figure of Blas Cabrera Felipe, physicist considered “father of
Spanish physics.”
Olga Smirnova graduated from the Physics Department of the Moscow State University in 1996
and received her PhD there in 2000, continuing as assistant professor. In 2003 she received
the Lise-Meitner Fellowship of Austrian Science Foundation (FWF) and joined the Vienna
University of Technology as a postdoctoral fellow. In 2005 she moved to the National
Research Council (NRC) in Ottawa, Canada, where she became a permanent staff scientist in
2006.
In 2009 she received the SAW award of the Leibniz society and moved to the Max
Born Institute to establish her own Strong Field Theory research group, which she continues
to lead. Since 2016 she also holds full professorship at the Technical University Berlin. In
2010 Olga has received the Karl-Scheel-Preis of Physikalischen Gesellschaft zu Berlin, in
2020 the Ahmed Zewail Award in Ultrafast Science & Technology of the American Chemical
Society and in 2022 Mildred Dresselhaus Prize. Olga’s current research focuses on imaging
and control of ultrafast electron dynamics in atoms, solid state materials, and molecules,
especially chiral molecules. Her research has been recently supported by the Horizon Europe
ERC advanced grant.
Ursula Keller, a tenured physics professor at ETH Zurich since 1993, directed the NCCR MUST
ultrafast science program from 2010 to 2022. She earned her Diplom from ETH Zurich in 1984
and a Ph.D. from Stanford University in 1989. As a Member of Technical Staff (MTS) at Bell
Labs from 1989 to 1993, she launched her independent research career. Keller co-founded
Time-Bandwidth Products (was acquired by JDSU in 2014), and K2 Photonics in 2023. Since
2022, she has served on the supervisory board of Jenoptik.
Her research is dedicated
to advancing ultrafast science and technology with advancements in ultrafast solid-state and
semiconductor lasers, utilizing semiconductor saturable absorber mirrors (SESAMs) and
achieving ultrashort pulse generation in the one to two optical-cycle regime with frequency
comb generation and stabilization. She applied these lasers to conduct attosecond
experiments testing fundamental processes in quantum mechanics and pioneered the attoclock
technique.
Her awards include the Swiss Science Prize Marcel Benoist (2022), OSA
Frederic Ives Medal (2020), SPIE Gold Medal (2020), IEEE Edison Medal (2019), OSA Charles H.
Townes Award (2015), EPS Senior Prize (2011), and two ERC advanced grants (2012 and 2018).
Keller has supervised 94 Ph.D. students, authored 516 journal articles, and holds an h-index
of 122 with over 55,000 citations according to Google Scholar. In 2022, she authored a new
graduate textbook on "Ultrafast Lasers" published by Springer Verlag.
Irene is a PhD candidate in Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at the University of
Cambridge, specialising in cosmology. Her research uses the lensing signal imprinted on the
cosmic microwave background to learn more about structure growth in the Universe. She works
as part of the Atacama Cosmology Telescope and Simons Observatory collaborations.
Irene holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Physics from Universidad Complutense de Madrid and a
Master in Advanced Studies in Astrophysics from the University of Cambridge, graduating top
of her class in both degrees. During this time, she also interned at various institutes
across Asia and Europe, including the University of Oxford (UK), the Max-Planck-Institute
for Astrophysics (Germany) and Academia Sinica Insitute for Astronomy and Astrophysics
(Taiwan).
In 2022, she was the winner of the V WONNOW Women in Science and
Technology Awards. As a strong advocate for increasing the number of women in STEM, Irene
participates in numerous outreach events and gives interviews in local media.
Veronica Sanz is a full Professor of at the University of Valencia (Spain), and previously
at Sussex (UK). Originally from Valencia, she worked at MIT, Harvard, Yale, Boston, York and
Durham universities, besides her hometown university and CERN (Geneva).
Her main research line is on Particle Physics, to answer questions such as the genesis of
our Universe, and what it is made of. To pursue these research goals, mathematical models
need to be developed and contrasted with Nature's behaviour in experiments. This comparison
often involves the use of sophisticated numerical techniques, such as AI.
Besides her activities in fundamental physics, Sanz works on broader questions like the
understanding of intricate ecological interactions, the polarization of political discourse
or the understanding of Art from an AI perspective.
Inmaculada holds a B.Sc. in Physics from Universidad de Sevilla and an M.Sc. in Photonics
from the Friedrich-Schiller Universität Jena, Germany, where she specialized in
nanophotonics and nonlinear optics. Currently, she works as a scientific assistant at the
Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, where she merges the fields of quantum optics and
nanoplasmonics to understand the generation of entangled photon pairs, crucial for quantum
technologies.
Dedicated to fostering a diverse scientific network, Inmaculada has been an active member of
RSEF's Students Group (Grupo de Estudiantes) since its foundation in 2018. She has held
various positions within the group's directive board -including secretary, treasurer, and
vice president- and is also engaged in other renowned international scientific societies
such as Optica and SPIE. This experience has provided her with a broad overview of the
evolving role of young physicists in the 21st century, who increasingly navigate
multidisciplinary teams and bridge the gap between academia and industry.
President of the Donostia International Physics Center (DIPC), he is Professor of Condensed
Matter Physics at the University of the Basque Country, Honorary President of Jakiunde
(Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters), founding President of the Nanogune Cooperative
Research Center (CIC) and of the Materials Physics Center (MPC). He holds a degree in
Physics from the University of Navarra, a Ph.D. from the Universities of Cambridge (1976)
and Autónoma de Barcelona (1977), a postdoc at Oak Ridge National and a Nordita fellow in
Lund and Copenhagen. He was Minister of Education and Culture and spokesman of the Basque
Government (1980-1984).
Member of the Royal Academy of Sciences, the Academy of Sciences and Letters of Milan and
the Académie Royale de Belgique. He has been overseas fellow at Churchill College and
visiting professor at the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge. Fellow of the American Physical
Society (APS) and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (FAAAS). He has
been a member of the Trilateral Commission (1996-2015).
He is the author of more than four hundred publications in specialized journals and books.
He has received several awards, among others Euskadi, Dupont, Príncipe de Viana de la
Cultura, Max Planck, Premio Príncipe de Asturias de Investigación Científica y Técnica,
Iberdrola, Nacional Blas Cabrera. He has been distinguished with the Grand Cross of Alfonso
X the Wise, the Gold Medal of Navarra, of Guipúzcoa, of the Royal Society of Physics, of the
University of the Basque Country and of the University of the Basque Country.
Itziar Otegui, Outreach Manager at CIC nanoGUNE since 2012, has coordinated the design and
implementation of the Gender Equality Plan at the research center. She graduated in
Humanities and Communication at the University of Deusto, and earned a postgraduate degree
in Science Journalism and Science Communication from the UNED.
She is specialized in corporate communication and science communication. In addition to
managing the corporate communication and outreach programs of the research center, she has
participated in the creation and coordination of several outreach and STEAM education
projects, such as 10alamenos9 and Nanokomik. She participated in the creation of the
Emakumeak Zientzian (Women in Science) initiative in 2017, and has coordinated several of
its editions. At nanoGUNE she also coordinates the co-curricular training of research staff,
participated in the constitution of the Gender Equality Committee of the center and is
responsible for the implementation of the GEP.
Jorge Bravo-Abad is currently a professor (Profesor Titular) in the Condensed Matter Theory
Department and the Condensed Matter Physics Center (IFIMAC) at Universidad Autónoma de
Madrid (UAM). He earned his Ph.D. in Physics at UAM in 2006 and conducted postdoctoral
research at MIT from 2007 to 2010. Returning to UAM as a Ramón y Cajal Fellow in 2010, he
became a faculty member of the Condensed Matter Theory Department in 2016. He served as a
Visiting Associate Professor (Fulbright Scholar) in the Physics Department of MIT during the
2018-2019 academic year.
His research group focuses on discovering fundamentally new concepts, theoretical
approaches, and physical phenomena at the crossroads of condensed matter physics, materials
science, and machine learning. Committed to education, Jorge Bravo-Abad has been
instrumental in integrating artificial intelligence into the scientific curriculum at UAM.
In 2020, he founded the Spanish Network for AI in Condensed Matter Physics and Materials
Science, uniting over 30 academic and industrial research groups to foster the adoption and
innovation of AI in condensed matter physics and materials science.
Born in Segovia, he earned his Ph.D. in Physics at University of Valladolid in 1983. Since
2003 he has been Professor of Applied Physics at the University of León. He has been a
professor at the University of Valladolid, a visiting professor at the U. Paul Sabatier
(Toulouse, France) and at the U. of Barcelona (Spain) and has also taught doctoral degrees
at three universities in Brazil. He has been the director of the thesis of 15 Ph. Ds.
He is the main PI of a scientific research group whose main objective is the meteorology of
severe weather situations, a leading group in hail precipitation research. Likewise, the
group has specialized in aeronautical meteorology in which it has achieved some milestones
related to aeronautical safety.
He has published more than 120 scientific articles in international journals and has more
than 200 communications at conferences. PI of 22 R&D&i projects earned in competitive calls
and in more than 50 research contracts with national and foreign companies and public
entities.
He has been Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Atmospheric Research for 10 years. He has
received some awards and decorations, among which I highlight the cross for aeronautical
merit awarded by the Ministry of Defense.
He is currently director of the Environment Research Institute of the University of Leon,
vice president of the Spanish Meteorological Association (AME) and until December 2023 has
been president of the Spanish-Portuguese federation of meteorological societies (Flismet).
Claudio Zeni is currently a Senior Researcher at Microsoft Research Cambridge, contributing
to the AI4Science initiative.
He received his Ph.D. in computational physics at King’s College London in 2020, and
subsequently worked as a post-doctoral researcher at the International School for Advanced
Studies (SISSA) before joining Microsoft Research in 2022.
His research is focused on leveraging artificial intelligence to broaden our toolkit for
addressing environmental issues, specifically within the field of materials science. His
work involves the development of methods for discovering new materials, understanding their
atomic-level behavior, and predicting their properties. His expertise includes machine
learning force fields, generative models for crystals, and molecular dynamics
simulations.
As an active participant in the scientific community, Claudio has organized several
conferences on machine learning for materials science and has had the opportunity to present
his research in many conferences around the world.
Jonathan Home has been a Professor at ETH Zurich since 2010, when he established the
Trapped-Ion Quantum Information group. He moved to ETH Zurich following post-doctoral
research at NIST Boulder, working on a Lindemann Fellowship in the group of Dave Wineland.
His undergraduate and graduate studies were performed in Oxford, the latter under the
supervision of Prof. Andrew Steane.
Jonathan Home's research focusses on quantum state engineering and control with atomic
systems, primarily trapped ions. The group has produced pioneering work across a range of
areas, including first demonstrations of continuous feedback stabilization of entangled
states based on in-sequence measurements, dissipative protocols for state stabilization, and
the first demonstration of full quantum error correction in an ion trap system, using
motional states of a single ion. This work has been accompanied by a focus on advanced
technology for scaling ion trap systems, including new methods for constructing ion traps,
pioneering implementations of quantum gates using integrated photonics and the first loading
and quantum manipulation of ions in a new architecture for trapped-ion control based on
microfabricated Penning traps. The TIQI group have recently also managed to put barium atoms
on display to the public, in a new permanent exhibit at the hands-on Technorama science
museum in Winterthur.
Jonathan's research work has been recognized by a number of prizes, including the 2019
Landauer-Bennett award of the APS and the ETH Zürich Latsis prize. In 2023 he was named as
an APS Fellow. Jonathan has also been recognised for his contributions in teaching and
outreach, including the Golden Owl of ETH Zürich and being named as a TED Fellow.
Alessandra Buonanno is a director at the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics. She
specializes in modeling gravitational waves from binary systems of black holes and neutron
stars, aiming to address open questions in cosmology, astrophysics, and gravity. Her
research on waveform modeling has been instrumental in the detection and physical
interpretation of gravitational waves with LIGO and Virgo detectors. Buonanno pioneered and
greatly contributed to the successful synergistic approach of combining numerical-relativity
techniques with analytical-relativity methods with the goal of developing the most accurate
and efficient waveform models for gravitational-wave observations.
Alessandra Buonanno studied theoretical physics in Pisa, and held faculty positions in Paris
and at the University of Maryland, where she became professor in 2010. She is a Principal
Investigator of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration and a Research-Unit Head of the Einstein
Telescope Collaboration. She is a member of the LISA Consortium Board. For her contributions
to gravitational-wave research, she was awarded several prizes, including the 2018 Gottfried
Wilhelm Leibniz Prize – the most prestigious research prize in Germany. In 2021 she was
co-awarded the Galileo Galilei Medal, the Dirac Medal, and the Balzan Prize.
She received the 2022 Tomalla Prize for her outstanding work on gravitational-wave physics,
and the 2023 Oskar Klein Medal. She is an elected member of the German National Academy of
Sciences Leopoldina, the US National Academy of Sciences, the Italian National Academy
Lincei, and the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities. Buonanno is a Fellow
of the International Society on General Relativity and Gravitation and of the American
Physical Society. She holds a research professorship at the University of Maryland, and
honorary professorships at the Humboldt University in Berlin, and at the University of
Potsdam.
Prof. Dr. Clivia. M Sotomayor Torres obtained her PhD in Physics in 1984 from the University
of Manchester, UK. She held tenured academic appointments at Saint Andrews and Glasgow
universities in the UK, a C4 professorship at Wuppertal University in Germany and was a
research professor at the National university of Ireland University College Cork (Tyndall
National Institute). From 2007 to 2023 she was an ICREA research professor and group leader
of the Phononic and Photonic Nanostructures group at the Catalan Institute of Nanoscience
and Nanotechnology in Spain. Clivia received awards from the Royal Society of Edinburgh, the
Nuffield Foundation and an Amelia Earhart Fellowship from ZONTA International (USA). She
carries out research in the science and engineering of phononic nanostructures,
nanophotonics and thermal transport. She was a guest professor at the P. Sabatier Univ.
Toulouse, at the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) in Sweden and the Mittlesten-Scheid
Guest Professor at the University of Wuppertal in Germany.
She has supervised over 20 PhD theses and more than 60 postdoctoral researchers.
She has published extensively and has been cited over 12 000 times.
Since 1989 Clivia has been, and still is, an active participant in European level research
and has coordinated several projects. She has held several commissions of trust including
membership of the Danish National Research Council board, vice-chair of the Scientific Board
of the Silicon Austria Laboratory and co-Chair and Chair of the Advisory Group of the EU
Future and Emerging Technologies. In 2020 she was elected to the Academia Europaea and since
2021 she is a holder of an ERC Advanced Grant carrying out research on phonons for
information and communication Technologies.
Since September 2023 she is the Director General of the International Iberian Nanotechnology
Laboratory (INL) in Brage, Portugal.
July 15-19, 2024
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